Mixed feelings re Walmart

When learning that a new business will soon be calling Vallejo its home, I was initially overjoyed.

The business to which I am referring is the Walmart Neighborhood Market nearing the end of its construction. This Walmart has taken up the space left behind in 2008 by a former Mervyn's store.

Vacant for years, the retail space at Sonoma Boulevard and Sereno Drive will finally be put to good use. The 52,726 square-foot establishment will soon be filled with a variety of fresh and frozen foods, and more importantly, many new jobs for Vallejo citizens.

As of March, Vallejo's unemployment rate was 11 percent, the highest reported in Solano County. Bringing new jobs to a city that desperately needs them, Walmart has come to the rescue. Or so it appears.

What I find interesting is that this Walmart is essentially another grocery store drowning among its peers. After all, think about what is around that location. A variety of shops, restaurants, doctor's offices, and yes, grocery stores. Raley's is 0.4 miles away. Smart and Final, 0.8 miles. Seafood City, 0.5 miles. And if you continue down Sonoma Boulevard, Foods 4 Less is 1.6 miles from the Walmart location.

I can't help but wonder, does Vallejo really need another grocery store? And if so, should it really be in such close proximity to a cluster of other grocery stores?

Sonoma Boulevard, being such a long stretch of road, provides a prime example of what are becoming known as "food deserts". Food deserts are defined by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as "urban neighborhoods and rural towns without ready access to fresh, healthy and affordable food." If you drive down Sonoma towards South Vallejo, it should become apparent that these people do not have access to healthy food. There are no groceries stores. Liquor stores and vacant lots are the norm.

These areas are low-income, and a percentage of these individuals do not have a vehicle and rely on other means to get around. Many people in this situation frequent the corner store, which supplies packaged foods like chips, cookies, sodas and other unhealthy items because it is simply a challenge for them to get where the groceries are.

Does Vallejo really need another grocery store?

Yes. But putting one right next to four others hardly addresses the needs of those in Vallejo that are not able to get there. Something still needs to be done.

Sarah Dowling

Vallejo

Taxes will rise, unless ...

"If costs are not cut, the eventual result will be a huge rise in taxes when the pension funds run out of money. The burden will fall on private-sector employees, who do not qualify for such a gilded retirement. They will not be happy." -- The Economist, State Pensions in America, June 15, 2013

CalPERS and STRS will run out of money soon if you and I don't start paying more in taxes. Or city, county and state employees step up and reduce the cost of their retirements to you and me.

The numbers don't lie. People we voted for to provide the services we wanted from government and those they hired didn't pay attention to how much they promised to pay for salaries and benefits and for CalPERS and STRS retirement packages.

According to The Economist and other knowledgeable sources, STRS alone needs $4.5 billion more a year for the next 30 years to pay for the retirement promised to current and future teacher retirees. That dwarfs the small $1.2 billion estimated surplus California Governor Jerry Brown touts. And the state owes a similar amount to CalPERS.

Every single city, county and state employee and those who teach us and our children will retire with the promise of more income and better health coverage than you or me because we didn't work for a California city, county or for the state. With the aging of Californians ...you and me ...we must pay more and more of our meager retirement income in increased taxes to pay for the retirement packages of retired city, county and state employees IF NOTHING IS DONE NOW!

Right now, today, you and I are paying for two city employees. We pay for those who are now working and for another who is retired. Many retired City employees receive the same amount of retirement income as the income they received when they worked for us.

And you and I will pay many of those retired city employees for 10 years or more than you and I will live in retirement, since city employees can retire as early as age 50 with full retirement benefits.

IF NOTHING IS DONE NOW, if costs are not cut, the eventual result will be a huge rise in the taxes you and I must pay when the pension funds run out of money. Don't expect that there will much money to fix the potholes in your street.

This burden will fall on you and me, private-sector employees, who do not qualify for such a gilded retirement.

I don't know about you, but I will not be happy!

J.D. Miller

Vallejo

Remembering a friend

My friend killed himself yesterday!

The birds still sing, the sun came up.

My friend killed himself yesterday!

People went to work, babies cried.

My friend killed himself yesterday.

The wind is still blowing, the flowers still bloom!

My friend killed himself yesterday!

The dogs stopped barking at 2:14, the wind stopped blowing, and it was mighty quite for a moment

My friend killed himself yesterday.

Strange, life just keeps going on, it didnt stop, the world still turns.